


homework & candy canes

by ocdranboo



Category: Dear Evan Hansen - Pasek & Paul/Levenson
Genre: ADHD, Gay Jared, Gen, Homework, adhd jared, friend fic, liberal swearing, nyan cat - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-23
Updated: 2019-12-23
Packaged: 2021-02-25 23:27:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 560
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21923653
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ocdranboo/pseuds/ocdranboo
Summary: in which jared just can't focus on his homework
Relationships: Jared Kleinman & Alana Beck
Comments: 1
Kudos: 22





	homework & candy canes

Jared had 60 pages to read, 3 pages of terms to make notes on, and 4 hours to do it before his laptop where all his music was would shut down. For most, this wouldn’t have been a problem. But Jared was fucking panicking.

He was doing his homework with Alana, and the other girl had finished two pages already. Jared was still on the third term.

No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t focus. At some point he just went “fuck it” and started texting a friend on tumblr, but they’d gone offline, and Jared was left to do his homework. 

The problem was there were so many thoughts in his head, and he didn’t even know what about. Alana was lying on her bed scrawling down notes, and Jared was sitting at her desk, cross-legged, watching. She was objectively very pretty, and any lesbian or straight guy would probably see themselves as lucky to be in a room alone with her. But he was gay. 

Jared turned his music back on. He was listening to the Nyan Cat song, because he literally fucking hated himself. He nodded his head to the music, trying over and over to figure out what the book was saying. He wasn’t dumb, he just couldn’t fucking _read_. Why had he decided to take an AP class?

After scanning the pages for “Greek independence” five times, Jared gave up. He let out a frustrated groan and dropped under the table, curling into himself underneath it. Why was his impulse when under academic stress to just straight up shift into Cat Mode? He didn’t know. But he was under the table, and Alana had climbed down with him, sitting cross-legged in front of him, holding out a candy cane.

“Do you want this?”

Jared nodded and messed with the wrapping until he got it unwrapped, breaking off the curvy part to suck on.

“What part is most difficult for you?”

“I can’t _read_ ,” he said, tangling his hands in his hair. “I’m so stupid, I can’t even read a _book_.”

“You’re not stupid, Jared. You’re just struggling.” She pulled her braids back and started knitting them into one big braid. “Do you know what the hardest part is for you? Sometimes it’s hard to tell.”

“I can’t read so I’m trying to just find the words and read from there, but I can’t find ‘Greek independence,’” he said. 

“Okay. I’m gonna tell you something someone told me a few years ago.” She leaned back and grabbed his book, flipping to the back. “You can find almost any term in the index. You go there, and… G… Gr… not great… Greek… Greek independence. There it is. And it’s on page… 462. So you flip to 462…” she did so, and he scanned through the page until he found it at the bottom, just under the header.

“Thanks, Alana,” he said, unfolding himself and crawling out from under her desk. “I’m sorry for freaking out on you.”

“It’s okay, really.”

He clinked the candy cane against his front teeth. “And thanks for showing me the index. I always forget he exists.”

“He is, unlike most men, very useful,” Alana said, doing one of those not-quite-laughs that meant she was joking, but it wasn’t, like, ‘lose your fucking mind’ funny.

Jared snorted. “That’s fair, man, that’s fair.”

**Author's Note:**

> my tumblr is @trans-zoe-murphy !!


End file.
